surely her oyster. Within lay that pearl of great price--her happiness.
How simple it had seemed! Where was that confident girl now--the girl
who had been so sweetly "spoiled" by father and mother and sister, and
adoring friends? That girl had gone the way of all the other Sophies.
The baby-Sophy, and Sophy the four-year-old imp, and the grave,
independently religious Sophy of nine. Was she religious now? Why
couldn't she pray, then--really pray? Was that constant, dull cry of her
heart, "God help ... help ... help!"--was that a prayer? Yes, that must
be prayer.

A dulness came over her. Her mind refused to reason.

"At least I am really living," she thought. "This pain is living---- Oh,
mould me!" her heart called suddenly into the Void. "Mould me into
something higher!"

She seemed aware, in the pause of thought that followed, of an immense
Presence. Personal, yet Impersonal--one with her--with some part of her.
She seemed cherished and approved. A little after, she fell asleep.

She knew that she had been asleep, for she waked to that sense of
interval, of break in one's continuous life that follows on profound
sleep. At the same time there crept over her a chill sense of
uneasiness--the sense of a presence. It was not like that vast, lulling
sense that had come to her just before she fell asleep. No--this was
different, sinister. Something--some one--was in that dark room--with
her--near her--very near her. She held her breath. A wild leap of fear,
like a pang of bodily anguish, blazed suddenly through her. She was
sure--oh, horribly, dissolvingly sure!--that in the thick darkness a
face--a face that could not see her--was looking down on her. For a
second she lost consciousness. Then again came the blaze of fear, like a
bolt through her paralysed body. She must move--she must _know_--or die
of terror. She put up her hand. It touched a face--the dry teeth in an
open mouth--a grinning mouth. She felt sure afterwards that, had she
screamed then, she would have lost her reason with her self-control. She
fought with herself as with giants. One part of her said: "Shriek and
die." The other part said: "Don't give way--don't give way!"

"Cecil...?" she managed to utter.

"Ha!" said a voice that laughed low. "Plucky lass! Just thought I'd
give you a taste of what it is to be spied on. So-long. Sweet dreams."

She heard him fumbling his way out. The door clicked. For another minute
the terror held her. Then she struc